The Mystery of Cherry Ridge
by Ex libris anonymi
Summary: Its Vanessa's 21st birthday and when she recieves a mysterious letter addressed to her from 1962 calling her to the Cherry Ridge Manor on the outskirts of Danville things take a mysterious turn for the worst. A mystery/adventure with a hint of supernatural.
1. Chapter 1

**CH. 1 **

Vanessa woke up and smacked the annoying alarm clock and executed her normal morning routine. She'd get up at exactly 7:00 get in the shower, eat toast with cream cheese, brush her teeth, get her stuff together and, get her scooter, and then finally drove to work at the Danville bank. The only thing different about today is that today is her 21st birthday. It wasn't anything special for her and nobody in Danville really knew except herself (Of course) and her mother and father. Once she got to work she sat in her bankers' station and sat there all day as usual. Throughout the day she thought…

_Wow, my life is really boring, Ever since graduating high school I had no life. I'm turning 21 today and I will legally be an adult. I need to do something drastic to make my life rejuvenated again and to have my dad stop treating me like a kid._

When Vanessa's shift was over she got on her scooter and went back to her apartment in Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated. Yes she still lived in the same building as her father but she lived 3 floors down. As soon as she got in she threw her stuff on the counter and plopped down on the couch. As soon as she turned on the TV the doorbell rang. She sigh and rolled her eyes.

"I wonder who that could be" Vanessa Sarcastically said.

She went to the door and looked through the peep hole and believe it or not her father Dr. Doofenshmirtz was waiting there for her.

She opened the door and said

"Yes, dad" in an irritated way

"Ahhhh, Vanessa I have come to give you a birthday wish" Doof said.

"HAA-"

"STOP!" Vanessa cut him off "First of all there is no way I am allowing you to sing in the hallway and second I don't need you to sing to me so that I know you wish me a happy birthday."

Doof looked down the hall at a happy birthday crew including a ballerina, a clown, a guy dressed up in a bear costume holding a bouquet of flowers and a large bunch of balloons, a leprechaun holding a giant birthday card and a giant floating baby head.

He shooed them off before Vanessa could see.

"Uhhhh… any ways I got your mail for you"

"Oh great let's see how many bills I got this month" Vanessa said.

Vanessa took the pile of mail from her dad's and said.

"Thanks dad" and gave him a hug.

Doof left and Vanessa shut the door behind him.

Vanessa left out a happy sigh and said

"ahhh, dads"

She picked up her mail from the counter and sat down on her couch again.

"Bill, bill, bill, bill. ad, ad, bill, ad, letter, bill, bill, Wait letter!"

She threw all the other junk on the floor and picked up the letter and took a good look at it she wanted to soak the moment in because she needed to remember this moment she had nothing very interesting in her life anyway.

The envelope was yellowy-brown because of how old it was It was addressed to her in an old ink pen in wispy cursive writing. The back was sealed with a rubber stamp. The envelope was almost too perfect to be opened. She was just too excited to see the contents.

She ran to her kitchen to find a knife to open the envelope. She wanted to keep the envelope because she thought it was just to dang perfect.

She ran back to the couch so she can open the envelope. She stuck the knife in very carefully in order not to rip the envelope. She moved the knife very slow to the other side and once it was ripped just at the top. She let out a big sigh of relief. She carefully took out the letter in the envelope and before she opened it she felt the paper. It was parchment paper that was also a yellowy-brown. She took a big breath in before she opened the letter she hoped that she wasn't just getting worked up for nothing.

The penmanship was exquisite and still wispy cursive. The letter read….

Beware Vanessa! You are in grave danger! Believe me this is real. Come to the Cherry ridge manor immediately. This is a matter of life or death. You are our last hope.

S. 17 April 1962

P.S. The medallion may come in handy.

_What medallion _Vanessa thought.

She looked back in the envelope and there it was a large medallion attached to a long chain.

_That's weird I know that definitely wasn't there before…_

She took the medallion out carefully by pulling it out by the chain and she laid it on the table.

She took a good look at it and saw that the medallion was in the shape of a circle and it was very detailed. In the center there was a large blue gem raised above the medallion. It was shaped almost like a Mickey Mouse head with overly large ears. It almost seemed like the two ears were the exact same size of the head. She held it up to the light and the gem sparkled.

She put the medallion on the table next to letter and glanced back over at the letter.

She looked away for a moment and did a double take.

_Wait a minute 1962! _Vanessa thought

_This has to be some big joke. This can't be right…. Somebody is just trying to pull some big joke on me…. Maybe it could be real, What if this letter is from the past and it's from a ghost mailman! Wait a minute what am I thinking…._

Vanessa's thoughts trailed on like this for hours and she fell asleep on the couch thinking about it. When she woke up she made a final decision.

"I am going to Cherry Ridge Manor."


	2. Chapter 2

**CH. 2**

She knew this was a bad idea but she needed to prove a point to herself and her dad that she was no longer a little kid and she needed something in her life to give it some excitement.

She got up and did her normal morning routine as usual but instead of grabbing her stuff for work she grabbed the medallion, the letter, and her keys to her scooter.

She was actually excited to leave her apartment today which was really weird to her. She was always really groggy and irritated leaving her apartment in the morning

She drove to work and instead of going to her teller's station she walked right into her boss' office.

"Good Morning Vanessa, what do you need?" Said Vanessa's boss

Generally Vanessa's boss was a very nice person.

"I want to request my vacation early." Vanessa said in a demanding voice

"Why…?" Vanessa's boss said confused.

_I don't want to tell her the real reason why I need my vacation now because it's going to make me sound like I am a psycho or something. I better make something up fast! _Vanessa thought.

"Ummm I am going on vacation with my dad"

_Wow that's the best thing I can come up with _Vanessa thought angry with herself.

"Oh how nice, Ok that's fine with me but this means that this is your only paid vacation and you can't request any more in till your next pay period."

"Yes, that is completely fine with me"

"Ok than get out of here before I call the cops" Vanessa's boss said jokingly.

_Wow that's the worst joke I ever heard. _Vanessa thought.

Vanessa leaves the bank and gets on her scooter to go to the library. On her way there she is still constantly thinking about what could possibly happen at the manor. She starts to get a little bit scared and uneasy about the whole situation. She decides to not psych herself out and try not to think about it in depth any longer.

Once she gets to the library she parks her scooter and goes right in.

She sits at an open computer and goes to Map Quest. She types in Cherry Ridge Manor and finds out that it is about 20 minutes from where she is right now and it is on the outskirts of Danville. She prints out the directions and she gets on her scooter and she is on her way off to the manor.

It takes longer than expected to get to the manor. Once she arrives to the manor she parks her scooter at the large iron gates leading to it. She opens the gates walks up the long drive way leading to it.

The Manor is white with two old Italian statues of women near the entrance. There are lots of windows covering the front of the building. Crawling up the sides of the manor are dead vines. There is a large cherry orchid next to the manor and lots of other plants leading to the entrance of the building. All the plants are dead and over grown. There is a marble set of stairs leading to the front entrance of the building. All the lights are turned off and the place looks empty.

Vanessa calls out,

"S….. Where are you S!"

_That's strange no one's here, I might as well just go in._

Vanessa continues to the marble stairway and goes to the door. She pushes on the door and it is locked.

_If S needs my help so badly why would he lock me out? _Vanessa thought angrily.

She notices a door knocker on the other door. She goes over to it and knocks.

No answer.

She looks at the door knocker again and realizes the detail.

The Door knocker has a lion head right smack in the middle and there were colored engravings of different animals around it. There was a bird, a snake, a frog, a newt, and a dragon. She looks to her right and realizes there is a big pile of rummage next to the stairs. She goes to the pile and starts to look through it.

In the pile she sees that most of it is just gardening tools like gloves, and buckets and shovels.

_Looks like no one has used these in while._

She started moving stuff around to see if she can find anything interesting. She moved some stuff and found a small bird figurine.

_Awww this is so cute I should keep this and put it in my room._

She moves some more junk around and finds a small frog figurine.

_Wait a minute aren't these the same animals on the knocker. _

She goes back to the knocker and compares the engravings and the figurines. They matched! So she returned to the pile and continued looking to see if she could find all the other animals.

She finds the snake under a bucket, she finds the newt shoved in the mud next to a shovel, and she finds the final animal (a dragon) next to the steps. Once she collected all the figurines she went back to the knocker.

She knew this had to mean something. She just didn't know what. She put the figurines down on the marble stairs and picked up the newt. She went to compare the engraving with the figurine again but when she put the figurine next to the engraving she stumbled and banged the figurine on the door on top of the engraving. She held the figurine there while she composed herself. She felt the spot where she was holding the figurine start to get hot. The spot kept on getting warmer and warmer and then finally she felt the spot where the engraving was open and absorb the figurine. Once the figurine was fully absorbed she lifted her hand saw that the engraving was glowing. She did this with all the rest of the figurines and when she was done the lion in the middle of the knockers eyes turned red.

The door opens and she enters the building.

The doors lead to a wide hall. There is old junk all over the place. It looks like a scene from that show hoarders: Buried Alive but on a smaller scale. There are portraits of people down the length of the wide hall. There is also a beautiful chandelier above her. There is a grand staircase leading to a balcony style upper hallway that has doors leading to other rooms. The grand staircase is in bits and pieces and there is no way she would be able to get up to the top. At the end of the hall there is a large clock. And near her are two couches, a small statue of a sparrow and a large Italian styled statue of a woman like the ones from outside. Also there is a large fountain with a lion as its center.

She realizes that the medallion around her neck starts to glow an eerie light blue color.

The lights from the windows in the hall turn a dark gray and the whole hall becomes gloomy. Golden orbs of light fly past her, the arms of the clock at the end of the hallway starts to spin rapidly and the clock chimes 6 times. The doors behind her slam shut and all in a second everything stops and the hall starts to brighten again from the light outside.

"WHAT THE HELL! THIS ISN'T FUNNY!" Vanessa screams.

She turns quickly to the door and tries really hard to open them but they are locked from the outside.

"Now what?" Vanessa asks herself.


	3. Chapter 3

**Authors****note** :

Sorry it's taking me so long to update my chapters bear with me! Please read and review!

* * *

Ch. 3

Vanessa panics. "I have to find a way out!" she tells herself. She walks over the the statue of a sparrow removes the dust off the head with Her fingers. All of the sudden the small statue starts to rise from the pedestal and it opens with a small compartment. Vanessa inspects it and she has no idea what it could be for.

Next to the bird statue is a small fountain with a majestic looking lion perched on top. In the fountain there is no water, just dust. She walks around the perimeter of the fountain and on the opposite side finds a faucet meant to fill it, but there is no tap to turn it with.

Vanessa continues to look around the room to see if she can find anything useful and she finds a ladder.

"this 'oughta be good for something" she thinks.

She turns around and returns to the fountain and like magic a note appears in the lions open mouth.

"I know that wasn't there before" Vanessa says.

She uses the ladder she just found to retrieve the note.

Great, your finally here! Hurry up time is against us.

Now you need gems, because only they can open the portals. The first one is in the library. Find it.

Also in the envelope is a old key. She starts looking around the room again and

Finds a match book. She puts it in her pocket and makes her way for the door on the left side of the hall.

She takes the key she just collected and hopes that I works. She inserts it and turns it to the right. The door unlocks and reveals the library.

The library almost seems like an office but with lots of books. There is a desk off to the side and it's full of more junk and also has a globe on it. There is a chandelier in the middle of the room as well.

Vanessa continues to the desk and finds a ripped piece of paper attached to it with scotch tape. She removes it a reads it.

S's diary-day 1

I am so lucky the previous owner left me hundreds of books about magic. What if I find the book of shadows here, the lost writings of the legendary Cagliostro. I will search tomorrow.

"Does S believe in fairy tales about magic? What strange man brought me here?"

She continues to search the desk and finds potions, books, a globe, a scroll, candles, glasses, and a dagger. She also finds a bowl and collects it.

Vanessa starts looking at the shells in the library and notices that there is a mask on one of the shelves between some books. One of the eye holes is empty and the other has a round marble inside.

She returns to the desk and rubs up against it one of the drawers pops open and it holds another compartment for something which yet again she has no idea what for. As she sits on top of the desk she notices something shiny in the top of one of the shelves she bring the ladder from the hall into the library and puts it up against the shelf and climbs to the top.

The shiny thing was the missing tap to the fountain in the main hall! She quickly climbs down the ladder and runs to the main hall. She places the tap on the faucet and turns very hard because it is very stiff. The water begins to run and in the murky water she sees another thing shine.

She rolls up her sleeve and grabs it. It is a marble that looks oddly familiar...

"Didn't I see one just like this in library" she thinks.

She goes back to the library and look around. She then realizes that it belongs to the mask.

She rushes over and places the other marble in the open eye. The masks Moves over and it reveals a gem was an emerald green color.

"Wait didn't that note say something about a gem?"

Vanessa referred beck to the note and re-read it.

"Thats right! They said the gems can only open the portals."

Vanessa Began to be curious. She went backed to desk and tried to open the drawer but it wouldn't budge. Then Vanessa had to retrace her steps.

"what did I do last time that made the drawer open?.." she thought

Vanessa laughed a little and sat on top of the desk again. The drawer opened and she took the gem and put it in the compartment. It fit perfectly.

This compartment was different then the previous one in the main hall. This one had a gold circle around the outside and on the top and the bottom of the circle were two warriors.

Once she placed the gem in the compartment it started to glow green. The circle starts to spin rapidly and the gem disappears which reveals a bunch of moving gears the gears stop spinning and they disappeared and revealed just a black hole.

Vanessa squints her eyes and looks into the hole. She notices that a bunch of small green dots moving towards her. They keep on getting closer and closer and getting larger and larger and then she realizes they aren't dots. They fly out of the whole and circle around her. They form a circle around her in mid air and she takes a closer look at them and realizes they are some weird symbols or some sort of letters.

She walks forward toward the black hole again and the symbols follow her. She looks in the hole and sees that there are still symbols floating in there too. She then sees that one f the symbols in the hole matches one that's circling her.

She holds out her pointer finger and touches one of the symbols it moves a little bit but then returns it's place. She uses her pointer finger and her thumb to pick up the symbols and then she reaches in the hole and picks up the matching symbol she put both of them In the hole. They stick together and it floats as one in the hole.

She takes all of the symbols out of the hole and throws them in the air. They float around her as well and she matches the rest of them and puts them in the hole as she goes along.

Once all the symbols are matched the drawer starts to shake violently and the black hole turns blue. The gold circle starts spinning rapidly and Vanessa is sucked in through the hole.


End file.
